Office of the Press Secretary
(Claremont, New Hampshire)
________________________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release June 11, 1995

REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
AND SPEAKER NEWT GINGRICH
AT EARL BOURDON SENIOR CENTRE PICNIC

Earl Bourdon Senior Centre
Claremont, New Hampshire

4:45 P.M. EDT

MR. GENDRON: While you're standing, please, a standing
round of applause for the Stevens High School Band. (Applause.)
They've been practicing day and night.

At this particular time I would like to also recognize
someone who has worked on behalf of the senior organizations for many,
many years, has been one of our greatest supporters, Jim Chmelik, from
the National Council of Senior Citizens. Would you please -- standing
round of applause. (Applause.)

Ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in
welcoming the President of the United States, William Jefferson Clinton.
(Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank
you very much, Lou. Mr. Speaker, Governor, Mayor Lizott, Congressman
Bass, Mrs. Gingrich, Mrs. Zeliff; to Sandy Osgood and to the Stevens
High School Band, thank you very much for keeping everybody entertained
while I got away from Dartmouth and got over here.

I'm am delighted to be back in Claremont again. I have
spent some happy days here. And I was invited to come here, as you
know, when you folks -- I think it was actually Lou's idea; he found out
I was going to be at Dartmouth giving the speech. And then I was
interviewed and someone said, well, the Speaker is going to be here for
the whole weekend, what advice would you give him? And I said, well,
I'd give him two pieces of advice. I think he ought to -- if he's going
to be in Concord, he ought to go down to Mary Hill's Grocery Store and
talk to her because she's a wise woman. And he ought to do one of these
little town meetings like I do from time to time. And so he called and
he said, "I accept." (Laughter.)

So that's how you became transformed into this. I'm
going to talk for a couple of minutes; he's going to talk for a couple
of minutes. Then we're going to spend most of our time just answering
your questions. But let me be very brief and say that when I came here
in 1992, I was running because I thought we ought to change the
direction of the country. I thought that we were in danger of losing
our standard of living and that we were coming apart when we ought to be
coming together. I was worried about the decline in middle class
incomes, the growth of the underclass, the high unemployment rate at the
time, an exploding deficit, a declining level of investment. I was also
worried very much about the breakdown of our families, the number of
children growing up in poverty, and the whole breakdown of a lot of the
social factors that are very important to all of us and made us what we
are.

I said then, and I will reiterate today that I thought
what we needed then -- I still believe what we need -- is
an economic strategy that focuses on creating jobs and raising incomes;
a social strategy that rewards work and family, in terms of welfare
reform and everything else we do, it reinforces responsible
child-rearing and responsible work; that we ought to do it in a way
that reduces the size of the government and reduces the bureaucratic
burden of the government, but kept the government on side of ordinary
Americans.

Now, what I tried to do is follow policies from whether it
was reducing the deficit, expanding trade, increasing investment in
education, promoting welfare reform, things that would help people to
make the most of their own lives. I've also tried to do things I
thought would increase security for American people, whether it was the
Family and Medical Leave Act or the crime bill or the things we've tried
to do in foreign policy, or the antiterrorism legislation that the
Speaker will take up when the Congress meets again starting tomorrow.

Now, we have a lot of differences, and perhaps these
differences will come out. But we also have some areas in which we can
work together. I think the most important thing is that we try to
identify clearly the places where we disagree, but then make our best
effort, our dead-level best effort, to work together to move this
country forward. (Applause.)

It seems to me that a lot of our problems are not
particularly partisan in nature. We do have -- for example, as I have
said from the day I became President, we cannot afford not to do
something about the fact that Medicare and Medicaid costs have risen at
much more rapid rates than government revenues are going up, so that
every year we spend more and more on Medicare and Medicaid, which means
we have to either spend less on something else or explode the deficit.
But I think how we do it and how long we take to do it and the manner in
which we do it is critical.

So we need to discuss these things in an open way. And one
of the things that I like about New Hampshire that I don't like about
modern politics, generally, because it's so different is that when I was
running here in '92, I really felt that most people were making their
decisions based on encounters like this rather than 30-second television
ads or some blurb that comes across the airwaves where one politician is
hitting another one and trying to use some emotional issue to divide the
American people instead of to bring them together. I think that is what
you have done for presidential politics, which is why I hope you'll
always be able to have this first-in-the-nation primary for both
parties, so we'll all have to go through this process of getting to know
each other. (Applause.)

So having said that, I'd like to now bring the Speaker --
I'll let him say a word or two and then we'll get on with your
questions.

Mr. Speaker. (Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Let me say -- let me say, first of all,
that I am delighted to be here, and I appreciate very, very much --
(audience disruption) -- I appreciate very much the opportunity to be
here. And I want to thank both Lou Gendron and I want to thank the
President for having been willing to allow me to come over. I think
despite this particular gentleman, I think that the tradition of New
Hampshire for town hall meetings is exactly the right sort of thing to
do.

Now, let me just say, if I might, that I am delighted to be
here and that you ought to know, this is a historic moment. The
President visiting you, as we are told -- the first time since, I
believe, Calvin Coolidge came here in the 1920s, that a President has
visited, although, of course, many candidates have been here in the
primaries. And I believe in all of American history there has never
been a town hall meeting where a President and a Speaker have been there
at the same time. So, literally, the city of Claremont is setting
history today. (Applause.)

Marianne and I are delighted to be here with Congressman
Bass and Mrs. Zeliff and with Governor Merrill. But I wanted to say two
things that have happened to me today that are classically New
Hampshire. One I did on my own and one the President recommended.

First of all, we got up very early this morning, and I want
to report that we did see four moose -- (laughter) -- and one of them
was a huge bull that stood in the middle of the road and stared until
every single photographer who was with me could get their picture.
(Laughter.) The other was, I have to report, Mr. President, I broke
down. We stopped at the Dunkin Donuts in Berlin this morning after the
seeing the moose, and this is why you've done better with figure than I
have with mine. (Laughter.) I failed. But I followed his advice.

Let me say also to the band -- I had a chance to listen a
while ago. I thought you set exactly the right tone and exactly the
right mood. I am grateful that you all would allow me to come and join
the President. I hope today we can talk in a positive way about the
positive things we Americans need to do.

And I agree with the President. The New Hampshire
tradition of this kind of a discussion where we can sit, you can ask
questions, we can both talk, and we're not in nine-second or 20-second
or clever advertisements or any of that stuff. And I just want to say
one thing about where we are that I think all of you can identify with.

I called my Mom a while ago and I called my mother-in-law,
and said, gee, I'm here now, and what should I do and all that.
(Laughter.) And I also talked to my two daughters. We have all three
generations involved now in this discussion.

But let me tell you what I really honestly believe -- and I
think this is pretty close to the President's -- most of you lived
through the Depression, and it was hard. And you saved freedom in World
War II. And you saved freedom in Korea. And you paid the taxes and you
worked at the jobs to help win the Cold War. And you raised your
children and you wanted them to live in a better country. And now,
you're helping raise your grandchildren.

And I believe all Americans can be told the truth and can
actually watch their leaders have honest, open disagreements and can
talk things ought, and we can find common solutions. And I believe in
this process, working with the President, with the House and the Senate,
with the governors. I believe we can get to a balanced budget in a
positive way. I believe we can save Medicare and it will not go broke
despite the trustees' report. I believe we can create a better future
for our children and grandchildren. But it's got to be done exactly
like here today.

So I hope with your permission, the President and I will
now have a dialogue with you and maybe the country can learn a little
bit about working together, not just buying commercials and attacking
each other.

Thank you for letting me be here. (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: Who would like to go first? Who's got a
question? Yes, sir.

Q I would, number one, like to say I'm sure Earl Bourdon
would be so proud of what is going on today. (Applause.)
And I also would like to say that only in New Hampshire can this be
that we can be having this conversation.

After the health care reform failure, the very, very large
disappointment the last two years, one of the things that some of us
recognize is that the special interest groups really are running the
country. Let me ask you both -- gentlemen -- both the question: Would
you be willing to have the same type commission as a base closure
commission to review the reform act as far as the political section? So
it would be out of the political scene; somebody would just say, these
are the rules and this is the way it goes. Thank you.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I would certainly be open to that.
Let me back up and say one of the differences we have -- let's talk
about one of the differences we have about this -- no one seriously
believes that the budget can be balanced unless we can reduce the rate
of increase in Medicare and Medicaid costs. We agree on that. We
disagree on how much we have to reduce it and how it ought to be done.

I also believe that it would be far better if we could do
it in the context of health care reform so that, for example, for
seniors, we would provide some incentives for less expensive but more
widely-available long-term care short of nursing homes. We would have
more emphasis on preventive care, because one of the big problems with
Medicare is -- there are three issues here. What is the medical rate of
inflation, and can we get it down to the overall rate of inflation. You
know, health care costs have been going up more than medical costs --
regular costs.

The second issue is how many new folks are coming on to
Medicare every year. The third issue is how much more will the same
people use the system because people are living longer and longer, and
the more you -- longer you live, the more you need to use it.

And all these things are at the core of what we have to
work out about how much we try to control the spending. It may be that
the only way to do that is in the context of some sort of base closing
commission, like you say. But I think we have to tell them what their
mission is. That is, it seems to me that the mission can't just be to
save money. It has to be not only to stabilize the Medicare fund over
the long run, but to do it in a way that doesn't force retirees without
the means to do it to shoulder much bigger increases for their own
health care, or run the risk of having professionals jump out of the
health care system.

Now, that is what my problem is. I just think that -- we
have to be very careful about this. We've worked hard to bring down the
cost increases. But to get much -- to go lower, we're going to have to
have structural changes that provide for real options and quality of
health care, in my opinion. Without health care reform, I don't think
you can go dramatically lower.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Let me just ask first, I -- let me stop
and please applaud. I think this is -- to have the President here is a
good thing. (Applause.)

Let me -- I think you were saying something a little
different. I'll talk about Medicare in a second. But I think you were
raising an issue that's very interesting. If I understood, sir, you're
suggesting that when this whole issue of lobbyists and campaign finance
and, you know, we have this whole issue about gifts in the Congress,
which I'm, frankly, very uncomfortable with -- I mean, I just -- I don't
know how all of you would feel, but when you come down to talking about
yourself, it's very tricky sometimes. And I think you were suggesting
-- I've never heard this proposed before -- that maybe if we had
sort of a blue-ribbon commission of people that really had respect and
integrity, that would look at the whole lobbying political process --

THE PRESIDENT: Is that what you -- I thought you were
talking about health care reform.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: No, no --

THE PRESIDENT: You want to do it on lobby reform? In a
heartbeat. I accept. (Applause.) Because, otherwise -- otherwise, in
this -- we cannot pass lobby reform or campaign finance reform or
anything else. I would love to have a bipartisan commission on it.
It's our only chance to get anything passed. I accept.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: -- let's shake hands right here in front
of everybody. How's that? Is that a pretty good deal? (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: I accept. (Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: I'll tell you, if every question is this
productive -- now, can I just take one minute, Mr. President, and talk
about the Medicare thing? I do think the President put his finger on
something here where I think we analyze it slightly different, but we
both have the same commitment. And let me say, because I did talk both
to my mother-in-law and my mother today, I can report that I'm checking
in pretty much with people who are immediately concerned about Medicare.

There are two differences. One is, I agree with the
President that there are a number of things that have to be changed
about health care in America. For example, I believe if you're in the
insurance system, we ought to guarantee tomorrow morning that you have
portability that you can change insurance and change jobs, and there are
no preconditions. And I feel this personally because my older daughter
has a precondition and she's been through a period where she had to
spend a whole year in vulnerability without any insurance.

So I think step by step -- I think where we disagreed
strategically is, I think you can do those one building block at a time
and get them through and get them signed. I think it's very hard as a
practical matter to get a big comprehensive bill through because it
seems to break down of its own weight.

Now, specifically on Medicare. I hope this summer that
we'll be able to work with the President and with his Cabinet. We're
going to propose a plan in general terms that takes current spending,
which is $4,800 a year per senior citizen, and moves it up over the
seven years of the budget to $6,400 per senior citizen. That takes into
account additional people. But it will be a $1,600 or 33-percent
increase. That's less than the current projections. I'm not going to
try to kid anybody. But it is an increase.

And what we're trying to do right now is find a way, first
of all, to guarantee that everyone who wants the current Medicare can
keep it. And it may -- you may have some increase in the amount you pay
much along the line you had in the last six or seven years. But you can
keep the current system. Nobody's going to be forced to change. Nobody
has to leave.

But at the same time, I'm hoping that working with the
President and his administration, we can find five or six additional
options: Managed care for those who want it. In some counties a lot
do; in other counties very few people do. Medical savings accounts,
which is a new idea that lets people have
savings which could then be applied to long-term care, for example. A
voucher system, which some big companies are now using which is very
effective where you can go to any doctor you want and we pay directly
to the doctor of your choice, your control. And finally, something
which I think will get overwhelming support for -- if you look at your
bills and you see waste or fraud, I'd like us to work in a system so if
you spot it and you report it, you get a percentage of the savings so
every senior citizen in the country has a good, sound reason to check
on waste and fraud to help us get that out of the system, because
there's a General Accounting Office report that says there's about $44
billion a year in waste and fraud in both Medicare and Medicaid
combined.

So I'm just suggesting, if we can work together and get the
Senate with us, we can, by the end of the summer, keep the current
system and offer four or five options and move towards a system where
you become a customer and you're making the choice for you about which
one you like. And if you prefer the current system, you get to keep it.
That's your choice.

THE PRESIDENT: Here's what my concerns are. Will I work
with them and try to work this out? Absolutely. But here's what my
concerns are. It sounds like a lot to increase something by one-third
over seven years. But that's about four percent a year. And this last
year we had medical inflation at about four and a half percent -- and
that was good. We don't know whether it will stay that way and the
problem is that the Medicare population is going to get older and older.
And as they get older, people use the system more. So I don't know that
we can keep it to four percent a year.

The Republican in the Senate, Senator Packwood, with the
major responsibility for this says tht we can stabilize the financial
fund of Medicare with savings at about half the level proposed in the
Speaker's budget. It's not really his budget, but -- well, it is now.
They passed it. And I would prefer not to say right now we're going to
cut at a level greater than I believe we have to in ways that I think
will certainly require a lot of people who cannot afford it to pay more
until we have explored all other alternatives -- because I believe we
can get there without doing this.

And as you know, I believe -- let me say, there are going
to have to be some changes. We cannot leave the system the way it is.
We can't pretend that just because we're at a senior center that there
will be no changes. There have to be some changes. But I think these
reductions from the projected levels of spending I think are too severe,
and what I favor is having a smaller tax cut and a smaller Medicare
reduction and Medicaid reduction. And then let's see how much we can
save year by year because we have not tried a lot of these things.

He and I both, for example -- I really believe you ought to
have incentives to join managed care plans. I don't think anybody ought
to make you do it, I just think you ought to have incentives to do it.
Out West, I know, there's one managed care plan for Medicare that offers
people the right to get into Medicare for 95 percent of what the
per-person cost is, and they give them a prescription drug benefit along
with health care and still make money.

I think you should have the right -- I think, you know,
people ought to be able to try to talk you into doing that, that that
ought to be an option -- not a requirement. If you want to stay in the
program, I think you ought to be able to stay in the program.

The way it works now is, you don't pay for part A, but you
do pay more, as you said, by about the rate of inflation for the doctor
bills and things like that. So that's where I
would start these negotiations. I'd say, let's cut it as little as
possible until we know how much we can save because if we lock
ourselves into a tax cut and we lock ourselves into other spending,
then we'll wind up just not funding it, even if we wind up hurting
people. And I don't think we ought to do that. I have no problem with
all these experiments, but let's know what we're going to do.
(Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Can I make one other comment? I'll just
make one quick comment, and then we'll go back to a question here.

But let me just say, I think in spirit we're not that far
apart. The thing that is driving us is that the trustees reported that
Medicare will go broke by 2002. It starts to lose money next year and
it literally runs -- this is part A. This is the hospital part. And
all of you -- folks who may be wathching may not get it. But every
person in this room understands part A, or every person in this plaza
understand part A.

We start first with two big steps here. And then I think
we can talk about exactly how we make the transition. One is, how do we
save it for your generation? And that's very, very important. And we
have to -- and the earlier we can take some changes, the easier it's
going to be to make that transition by 2002.

But I must tell you -- I become 52 this coming week. And
I'm older than he is, and you can see where the grey hair up here -- but
I started thinking about when the baby boomers start to retire, the
weight of the current system financially is so enormous -- and we've
seen some numbers -- $3,500,000,000,000 a year would be the cost of
Medicare alone, not counting Social Security.

And so, part of what I hope we can do is set up a second
commission -- to go back to this gentleman's idea -- and this would be a
commission that would look out beyond saving Medicare in the short run
and start to talk now about what do we need to do for the baby boomers
in their retirement years and their health care. Because, frankly, that
makes everything we're worried about -- the folks who replace us 20
years from now are going to have a much bigger challenge than we have in
figuring out how the baby boomers retire and what happens with them.

But I think that's something we could probably work on in a
positive way together.

THE PRESIDENT: Let me just, again, reemphasize two or
three points. I, in general, am going to agree with that. We need to
focus on some things we know right now will work. We know we could save
money long-term in the system if there were other options for long-term
care in addition to nursing homes. There will always be people who need
to be in nursing homes.

But there should be other options. Today there aren't any.
And you've got all kinds of middle-class families where the parents have
to spend down all their assets to qualify for Medicaid to get into a
nursing home because there's nothing else they can do. So we wind up
cutting off our nose to spite our face, you know. In order to keep the
family from going broke, the government winds us paying more than might
otherwise be necessary.

But to be fair, we don't know how to cost that out. We
ought to get more people the option of going into a managed care
program. If somebody says for the same price you're paying now, we
could also give you a prescription drug benefit, but you'd lose a few
options on who your doctors were, then you should decide whether you
want to do that or not. You could decide. We ought to do that. We
ought to do more wellness and prevention planning.

My only fear is that we should be very careful about how we
plan the budgets over the next five or six or seven years. When I
became President, the Medicare trust fund was projected to go broke in
1999. So we pushed it back to 2002. I think we have to push it back
another four or five years. We've got to keep doing that. But I agree
with -- one thing the Speaker said I absolutely agree with -- when you
think about what the baby boomers require, which is, what, 2019 or 11 or
whenever it was, I'm trying to push it -- whenever I get that age --
(laughter) -- that's going to require a significant long-term structural
adjustment. We'll have to look at what we can do there.

But the main thing we can't do -- we can't have this thing
go broke in the meanwhile. And I'm just telling you that less drastic
procedures in my judgment can keep it from going broke if we make some
other changes in our overall budgeting, without undermining our ability
to balance the budget.

Who's got another question?

Q My question is for Mr. Gingrich. The problems facing
our country continuously grow more serious. And yet Congress continues
to snip and snipe and they play the special interests and partisan
politics. When is Congress going to get together and work for the good
of the country? (Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: I think that's a very good question.
It's partly, of course, answered by the this gentleman, who I think has
a great idea. You now have us publicly in front of you and all these
reporters saying we're going to work together -- and I hope we can
develop a blue-ribbon commission pretty fast -- because that's a part of
it.

Part of it is why I said I was glad the President suggested
this and then agreed to do it. I think just having your leaders chat
rather than fight is a good thing. I think --it sets a different tone.

Now, I want to commend the President. He sent up some very
important antiterrorism legislation. We had a meeting of all the
Republican and Democratic leaders with him. We talked about it right
after the Oklahoma City bombing. It then got bogged down in both
Houses, frankly, more than it should have. Senator Dole then made an
appeal to the President because the Senate has -- see, in the House you
have very strict rules and you can get something through in a day if you
work at it. In the Senate, if you have one or two senators who don't
like something, it takes forever.

Now, I don't think the Arkansas legislature, back when the
President was governor, quite had a Senate that had that kind of power.
I think it was -- you know, this filibuster -- so Senator Dole appealed
to the President, and the President, frankly, rose to the occasion,
worked out a bipartisan agreement and, I think, dramatically changed the
tone of that antiterrorism debate and helped us get something through
that was very, very positive.

So I think there are steps like this. I hope -- I reacted
positively the other day when the President said he was going to have a
budget proposal. We're in conference now. But, frankly, if they do
submit something this week or next week, we're not -- I mean, we're
going to take -- we're going to sit down and look at it all. I think
this summer we ought to work on Medicare together. We shouldn't have a
Republican plan and a Democratic plan.

In the House we've tried that. We had Mike Parker,
who's a Democrat, who met with out budget committee members all through
the budget. We had some Democrats -- not a lot, but some -- who voted
with us on the budget. In the Senate, Senator Kerrey from the
Entitlement Commission and Senator Nunn and one other senator voted for
the budget.

But we ought to -- when we can, we ought to pick up on what
you said. It's very hard, though, for a practical reason. The Founding
Fathers designed the Congress to be where everybody sends their
representative. And it's the place where everybody shows up with their
ideas. And I'll tell you, some days, even with the best of will --
Congressman Gephardt, for example, and his wife, Jane, are good friends
to Marianne and me -- even with the best of will, you find yourself some
days wondering how did you get into the particular mess you're in.

And the Founding Fathers wanted an arena in the House and
Senate to fight out our passions instead of having a civil war. They
wanted us to send everybody from every part of the country. And their
idea was that they wanted a system so inefficient that no dictator could
force it to work. Now, the problem with that is --

THE PRESIDENT: They sure did that.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: I was going to say, they succeeded. We
can barely get it together voluntarily. So, Mr. President --

THE PRESIDENT: Let me say, I think there are a couple of
things we need to try to be candid about. One of my great frustrations
since I've been President is that -- I have a line that I sometimes say
in speeches; I'll just tell you, I was in Montana the other day and I
said, shoot, if all I knew about me was what I saw on the evening news,
I wouldn't be for me half the time either. (Laughter.) I mean, the
truth is that it is so difficult for us in Washington to communicate
with people out in the country, with all of the layers between, that
what often is the only way to break through is some fairly extreme
statement.

The Speaker is real good at that; he can break through like
nobody I've seen in a long time. (Laughter.) But it will get covered.
He can break through.

The easy way for -- let's take this Medicare debate. The
easiest way for us to break through is for him to say, they want to fix
the trust fund and the Democrats have no plan; and for me to say, he
cuts Medicare too much and it will cost you a lot. Now, the truth is we
both believe that, but it's more complicated than that. And the problem
we have is that in a difficult time like this, where we're moving into a
whole new era, there very often are not simple answers to complex
problems, but simple answers very often move the electorate.

So if you don't want that, if you want a reasoned debate,
and you really want to say to the Republicans and Democrats, look, get
together and do something that is good for the country and put party
aside, then out here in the country, when the congressmen and the
senators come home on the weekends, you need to tell them that. And you
need to say it over and over and over again: We will stay with you. We
will not be spooked by this or that lunge in one direction or the other.
We'll give you four, five, or six months to try to work through this
budget and that's what we expect you to do.

You have to send a different signal. You have to send a
different signal. You have to make people believe they can take
complicated positions, explain them to you, and if you think that makes
sense you'll stick with them. And if you do that, I think you can
change the way politics work in America.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Can I make one quick story before I
take another question, because it is so much what he just said and I,
actually, I wrote it it in a book -- it was so vivid to me.
(Laughter.) I'll get to -- you're going to love this. No, you're
going to love this.

THE PRESIDENT: Senator Dole hasn't given me permission to
read that book yet. (Laughter.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Well, I thought I'd get you a copy soon.

THE PRESIDENT: That's good. (Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: But let me tell you, because it was so
vivid and it makes the President's point. We had a meeting you'll
remember well where Dick Armey and I were down there and the whole brand
new leadership after the election. And, obviously, the President wasn't
all that thrilled to have the Republicans win the election. And we
understood that, and, heck, we wouldn't have been -- you know -- I
wasn't all that thrilled, frankly, to have George Bush lose the last
one, so we understood his feelings.

We had a great meeting. It was a meeting that I almost
could have been n C-SPAN because the country wouldn't have believed --
we talked about line-item veto, which is currently a little bit bogged
down, but we'll get to it.

THE PRESIDENT: Give it back to me. (Laughter.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: We talked about unfunded mandate reform,
which he signed very early. We talked about passing the Shay's Act to
apply the law to the Congress that applies to us, which he signed very
early. We had things going on that were positive. Dick Armey and I
walked out front; we're in the White House, in front of the White House
drive there. We say to the White House press corps: We had a great,
positive meeting. We're going to be able to work a lot more than people
think. And we began to list these things.

The second question we were asked -- "What do you think it
will break down over?" And both of us got mad. He's right, I get too
hot sometimes. So I just said to the reporter -- I said, you just heard
the leaders of the Republican Party say that the Democratic President
today had had a wonderful meeting on behalf of America; we're trying to
work together. Couldn't you try for 24 hours to have a positive,
optimistic message as though it might work?

It's a true story and he did it. It was a great meeting
that he called. (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: The trick is, in a funny way, is not to
hide the differences, but to get them out in a way that -- where those
of us on opposite sides can understand the other's opinion. Like
there's a way to make an argument -- to get the maximum amount of votes
out of it in the shortest amount of time through emotion, and there's a
way to make the same argument so that you're opponent at least
understands your position. And I bet it's the same way here around a
gaming table, or anything else. There's two ways to talk to people when
you've got a difference of opinion.

More than half the time in this country -- this is an
interesting little historical fact -- more than half of the presidents
who have served have had the Congress in the hands of the opposite party
at least one, if not both, Houses. Now, that's what -- the voters seem
to think that's a good idea and they keep doing it. So we have to try
to figure out how to make that work.

Q I think, Mr. President and Mr. Speaker, that by your
being here today and talking the way you are to each other today, that
you may help turn our country around and get rid of this back-biting
which has prevented our country from going ahead during the past 10
years. And I congratulate you both for being here. (Applause.)

Mr. Speaker, in your introductory remarks you mentioned
that us folks experienced World War II and the Korean War, and we did.
And we fought a war -- we hoped we'd never fight a third world war. And
our Presidents, President Roosevelt and President Truman, with the
leaders of the Republican Congress as well, helped set up the United
Nations. And for 50 years we have prevented a World War III.

And we are worried as we move off the scene that our
children will not have the peace that we have had, even though it has
been marked by interim wars. And we are worried that the United Nations
will not have the support in the future that it's had in the past. And
we're concerned, Mr. Speaker, with, I think it's called H.R. 5, which
would gut -- H.R. 7 -- which would gut the United Nations and the
peacekeeping effort that we've had in the past. We hope that you can
ressurrect that bill and provide the United Nations the strength so we
will give credit to our veterans who died in the last war and that we
might have peace and keep the United Nations going. (Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Let me say, first of all -- and I
appreciate very much your comment about the two of us being here. And I
hope you're right.

Let me say, first of all, on a lot of foreign policy
issues, we work very closely together. And we have tried very hard on
Russia, on the Middle East, on a whole range of areas to be very
supportive. The President and his senior advisers have always been open
in briefing me and have always been open to my phone calls or my visits.
We've tried in the House to stop some things that would have been very
destructive. And I've tried in public, and I've learned a fair amount
in the last six months, that a Speaker -- it's very important for me to
be careful and to be modulated on a number of foreign policy issues.
And while we can tangle on domestic politics, there really is a great
lesson to be learned from Arthur Vandenburg in World War II.

But let me tell you the two things I think where maybe you
and I just disagree. And I hope you won't mind my being direct. First,
I don't think the last 50 years the peace was kept by the United
Nations. Over the last 50 years the peace was kept because the United
States of America spent a lot of money and sent its young men and women
all over the planet. And we were the strongest military power in
history. And we built an alliance called NATO. And we took enormous
risks. And our children -- my father fought in Korea and Vietnam.
We're now risking our children in Bosnia, in Iraq, in a whole range of
-- in Haiti, where the President, frankly, has so far -- and I hope it
works out perfectly -- has so far had a much better policy than I
thought he would. It worked better than I thought it would. And he
deserves to be commended for, I think, having taken some risk in Haiti.
(Applause.)

But, first, I will say to you -- first, I believe we have
to recognize that what won the Cold War and what kept the peace was
America's willingness to lead. And that nothing -- you're wearing a
Navy cap -- if my choice is three U.N. secretary generals or one
aircraft carrier, I can tell you which one I prefer to keep the peace in
a dangerous world.

But I want to say, secondly, about the U.N., because I'm a
big fan of Franklin Roosevelt's. I'm, frankly, a fan of Woodrow
Wilson's. And I think what they were trying to accomplish was terribly
important. I think we have to revisit the United Nation's current
structure. I mentioned this to the National Security Adviser the other
day.

The U.N. current system of command and control is a
nightmare. And anybody anywhere in the military -- and the President
knows this, because he get's briefed on it -- any of our military who
looks at what's been happening in Bosnia just wants to cry. You don't
send in the military to be hostages; you send in the military to rescue
hostages. And the U.N. system --I'm willing to take the U.N. system
seriously enough to actually encourage our government to take the lead
in reforming the current peacekeeping system, because if it's not
reformed, it's going to collapse and become a joke, and you'll see NATO
replace it in Bosnia in the not-very-distant future. And I take it very
seriously.

Over the long run Churchill once said, jaw, jaw, jaw is
better than war, war, war. And I think Churchill was right. But to get
there, we have to be strong; we have to lead our allies; and together, I
think, we have to learn the lessons of what doesn't work in the U.N.
And my hunch is, frankly, if this bill is going to ever become law,
there's going to be some fairly intense negotiating between Senator Dole
and myself and the President, because otherwise he's going to veto it
and we won't have the votes to override him. So I think we're not --
you're not going to necessarily see exactly the bill that's currently
there.

THE PRESIDENT: Let me just say very briefly, I agree that
the United Nations didn't keep all the peace in the last 50 years. What
I think is that the end of the Cold War gives us the opportunity to have
the U.N. fulfill its promise. And the United States has had, before me
and during my administration, serious disputes with the U.N. about the
way it's managed and the way certain crises are handled.

Now having said that, I disagree with the foreign affairs
bill going through because it ties the President's hands in too many
ways. I disagree -- I'll say something that's unpopular here -- I
disagree with all the cuts in foreign aid in the budget. Most people
believe that we're spending 10, 15 percent of your tax money on foreign
aid. We're actually spending about a penny and a half. We're spending
a smaller percentage of our budget on foreign aid than any advanced
country in the world. And yet, you'd be amazed how far a little bit of
money for the United States goes in stabilizing democracy all over the
world.

For the United Nations, a lot of -- some of their
peacekeeping has worked. It worked in -- it made a real contribution in
Cambodia. It's made a contribution elsewhere.

The problem in Bosnia -- let's just talk about that -- is
that great countries -- France, Britain, the Netherlands, Ukraine --
sent their soldiers there to be the U.N. peacekeeping force under terms
of engagement that the United States could never agree to because they
basically agreed until just this last incident that they -- the Serbs
could, in effect, take them hostage and they wouldn't fight back. And
we could never agree to that.

Now, having said that, it's still true that 130.000 people
died in Bosnia, civilians, in 1992, and under 3,000 died there last
year. And a lot of us made contributions to that. So, sometimes, as
bad and as ragged as it is, the U.N. is better than nothing. And I
think it is our forum.

And a lot of good things have happened in the U.N. We
have been able to pursue our nonproliferation agenda. We've been able
to pursue our action to reinforce what we're trying to do with North
Korea to keep them from becoming a nuclear power. We've been able to
do a lot of good things.

And I think we should look for ways to strengthen the U.N.,
not weaken it because I agree with him and what he said -- if it is weak
and if it fails, it will all come back on the shoulders of the United
States and another generation of young Americans will have their necks
on the line if we fail to have an effective, strong United Nations,
which is why I think we should support it and make it work. (Applause.)

Q I'd like to say that my philosophy is that if people are
working and getting a good wage that they will spend their money and
people will be able to, with the money they spend and buy things with,
the people that make that product will be able to work and get a salary.
X-amount of money of that will be sent back to our government in taxes
which will help run our country.

Now, I feel that -- I would like to ask a question that, by
the way I've talked, that both of you will be able to answer. Do you
really think that $4.50 is too much to make per hour -- the minimum wage
I'm talking?

THE PRESIDENT: No, I'm for raising it. (Applause.) You
know I am.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Let me say that I think that I'd like to
see every American make as much as they can possibly make. But I also
am concerned -- no, I don't think it's too much. I'm very concerned,
however -- there's a disagreement among economists about this. I'm very
concerned that if you raise the cost of the first job for the poorest
person, for example, in the inner city, that what you tend to do is
increase black, male, teenage unemployment which is exactly the thing
you don't want to do.

And so my goal is to have a rapidly-growing economy where,
frankly, wages keep going up because people are better educated, more
productive and can compete in the world market. And we've been telling
the Russians and the Ukraines and the Poles and the Hungarians that the
free market works and you've got to get out in a free market and you've
got to compete in a world market.

And my concern is just that as you go through this
transition that if we raise the minimum wage -- and, again, you get
economists on both sides of this argument. But the group we -- we don't
hurt anybody who's an industrial plant that's doing well. We don't hurt
anybody who's already working for the government. But if you are that
marginal employee and you're out there, you are the first laid off, and
that makes it harder for Hispanic and black teenagers to get decent
jobs. And we already have too much unemployment and too much long-term
lack of job skills among minority teenagers. But I think that's a
legitimate disagreement probably between the two of us.

THE PRESIDENT: Let me just tell you what the contrary view
is, what my view is. And it is true that there economic studies that
say if you raise the minimum wage, you raise incomes for people who are
at the minimum wage and a little above it, too, who get bumped up, but
it costs some jobs. There are other studies that say it doesn't cost
any jobs because, for example, people on welfare or out of the work
force will think it's more worth their while to come in and compete for
those jobs and they'll want to work more.

The reason that I am for it is that I believe that
-- first of all, I know that a significant percentage of people on the
minimum wage are women workers raising their kids on their own. And I
just believe that we shouldn't allow -- if we don't raise the minimum
wage this year, then next year, after you adjust for inflation, it will
be at a 40-year low. And my idea is that we ought to be trying to
create a high-wage, high-growth economy and that is as little regulated
as possible. But this is a minor amount of regulation on the bottom
end.

And there are other ways to deal with this market problem.
I know, Barbara Jordan, a former colleague of yours, headed a commission
for me on immigration. She's recommended a modest decline in the
immigration quota every year. And I think Senator Simpson, the
Republican Senator from Wyoming, has recommended the same thing. If you
did that, you might have exactly -- you might still, therefore, have
exactly the same demands for low-skilled people who are already in the
United States and you wouldn't, therefore, be any net out even if you
did raise the minimum wage.

I just think it is -- the people I guess I admire most in
this country are the people that get up every day and work their --
themselves to death for the minimum wage or just a little bit above it
--

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Note that editing, I my point out. That
was very well done. (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: Self-editing. And they come home and
they're dog-tired at night and they're raising their kids and they don't
have enough money to live on. And they don't break the law. They don't
cheat on their taxes. They don't do anything wrong, and it's all they
can do to keep body and soul together. And I guess, my instinct is that
you get way more good than harm out of it. And I believe, if you go
back to when they did it when -- the last time it was done was, when,
'89 or something, I think, on balance, we did fine as a result of doing
it. And I think we should do it again. (Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Can I add one more comment? Let me add
one more comment because I think he's making a point here that's very
important in thinking about the totality when you mentioned immigration.

I think, in addition to the recommendations of the
commission -- which I think was a very important thing to do and I think
that Barbara Jordan was superb person to head it up -- I think we've got
to look very seriously at illegal immigration because I can tell you,
even in north Georgia, we now have a very large number of illegal
immigrants working, for example, in the chicken industry. And it is on
the verge of getting out of control all over this country. And so even
if we were to close down legal immigration or slow it down, if the
illegal immigration just keeps pouring in, the effect of driving out
American workers is devastating.

Second, I think we have to have welfare reform that
reemphasizes work, which is part of why we, frankly, want to get it back
to the governors and have Governor Merrill working on welfare reform, to
reestablish work because if it costs you -- in New York City, if you
lose money going to work at minimum wage, then even when you raise the
minimum wage, you can't afford to go to work.

And so -- and the President, again -- he campaigned on
replacing welfare as you know it. And he's committed to welfare reform
that gets us in that direction.

The last thing, I guess, I'd like to say -- and I don't
actually know where you are on this right now. I believe we both have
to have much more adult education. I have suggested
we tie, for example, unemployment compensation to training so that
people, when they're not on a job, are learning. If we're giving them
money, they're actually getting trained and learning much more like the
Swedish and German model.

And part of the reason we proposed the $500-per- child tax
credit is because the day you go to work, you start paying Social
Security FICA taxes. It is very regressive on the poorest workers. And
the mothers the President has just referred to who may have, say, two or
three children, who are working at minimum wage, if they could get
$1,000 or $1,500 back from their government in a child tax credit, we
think that helps that mother take care of those children.

It's a different approach. But, again, it's a way of
trying to get more cash into those pockets. And I agree with the
President. We have got to find a way to get -- I think it's now 40
percent of our children are in poverty -- we have got to find a way to
raise our children and get those children out of poverty.

THE PRESIDENT: On illegal immigration -- we've increased
by about 40 percent the number of border guards we've got and we're
sending illegal immigrants back more rapidly than ever before,
especially if they come in contact with the criminal justice system.
What we need -- and maybe we can work together on this -- is the
capacity to go into more workplaces and find people who are taking jobs
away from Americans illegally. And I think that's important.

On welfare reform -- we don't have time to debate that
today. We agree on the ends. We have big disagreements about the
means. But I've given 29 of the 50 states permission to get out from
under all the federal rules and to do things like take food stamp and
welfare checks and give it to employers as a wage supplement; and let
employers then hire somebody off welfare and use the welfare check to
cut the employers' cost to put the people to work instead. And I think
that's good. (Applause.)

Q I don't think I can stand up. My name is Wreatha
Gendron, and I'm Lou's wife. I'm a former VISTA volunteer. And that's
how I got my start. And I think my question would probably be directed
to you, sir.

I went down to Concord. I was privileged to go down and
see the opening of AmeriCorps in Concord, New Hampshire. And I can't
get over the numbers of people that I saw. And when I was a VISTA
volunteer 14 years ago, there were -- I think everyone that was in my
group of people that worked in the state of New Hampshire have gone on
to become very successful and hardworking. And many, many of those
people in that group were single parents. And that's how they got their
start. And I consider myself extremely fortunate to be a VISTA
volunteer and support the AmeriCorps. And I'd like to know what your
views are on that.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: Sure. Let me say, this is an area where
I think the President has a good idea, but we disagree, I think, about
philosophy of government and about setting priorities. But it's not a
bad idea. I don't think AmeriCorps in any way is a bad thing. And I --
since I want to go first, I am confident that he will tell you how
vividly how good an idea it is.

But I have two concerns that I think are a different
direction philosophically. One is that I believe -- and we have people
like Congressman Colby and Congressman Nollenberg (ph) who are
developing a bill that would give every taxpayer a tax credit to give
the money directly to charities so that charities could do it directly.
I believe we want to have less Washington-based bureaucracy and fewer
decisions made in Washington. And we want
to strengthen the private charities.

So if you said to me tomorrow morning would I rather
strengthen AmeriCorps or the Salvation Army, the truth is -- and I
happen to agree with a book by Marvin Elasky (ph) called the "Tragedy of
American Compassion," where he argues that the kind of transformation
that you can get from 100 Black Men or from Habitat for Humanity, who's
pin I'm wearing -- the kind of groups that aren't restricted by
legitimate government restrictions, but are able to go in in a much more
spiritual basis and a much more directed basis and help people change,
you get a stronger, healthier society by getting it totally out of
government. That's a difference of philsophy about the size of
government.

There's a second difference. If we're going to balance the
budget, I think this is a time to be very tough-minded about priorities.
Now, the President lists this as one of his highest priorities and is
fighting very ably for it and is going to, frankly, keep it. If we can
get to a signable rescission bill, it's going to contain -- it's going
to keep AmeriCorps, and that's the power of the presidency. I would
just suggest that when you sit down and look at what it takes to balance
the budget over seven years or 10 years, it's hard. And if you're
setting priorities about which programs to keep and which not, you can
have a legitimate, honest debate about how many things you can afford to
do in Washington and how many things you need to get back home to New
Hampshire or you need to ask the private sector.

But it's an area where I -- I don't fault his vision and
his desire to recruit people at all, and I think it's, frankly, a
program that's very defensible. It's just one -- it's a question of
philosophy and priorities.

THE PRESIDENT: Let me give you my side of it. The reason
I got the idea of doing AmeriCorps was, basically, I thought we ought to
have more scholarship money available for young people that wanted to
further their education, or for even not so young people who wanted to
do it. And I thought we needed to promote the idea of service here in
this country among young people, at least in a symbolic way. If I could
fund it all, if the Speaker would support me, I'd get up to a couple
hundred thousand people in AmeriCorps in no time. But I wanted to do it
especially as we bring down the size of the military, because a lot of
young people who otherwise would have gone into the military and gotten
wonderful training and served their country in invaluable ways and
changed their whole lives forever now won't be able to do it because we
just have -- we don't have a need for the same size military.

And this idea intrigued me. It was promoted by a lot of
other people. I didn't come up with it, I just thought we ought to do
it. And it is not organized -- even though it's funded by Washington
and there's a general policy group in Washington or a board -- Governor
Merrill can tell you from what they have here in New Hampshire -- it is
very -- there is very little bureaucracy. People competed for the
money. If your project got the money, you just kept it. There's almost
-- very few reporting requirements and no rules and regulations from the
federal government. But with 20,000 people in AmeriCorps, which is what
we had this year, we have more people doing that than were ever in the
Peace Corps in any given year.

And the other day I was down in Dallas, just for example,
where a retired African American general supervises our AmeriCorps
program. And I saw four volunteers -- two girls who were teenage
mothers and on welfare, who got themselves off welfare, got a high
school equivalency, and were working to help other people get off and
earning money for college; a woman who was retired from the Navy,
believe it or not, who said, I don't even know if I'll ever use this
credit, I just wanted to serve my
country again working in the neigbhorhoods; and a young woman who had a
degree from the University of Florida, whose mother was on welfare when
she was born, and she had always done very well, and she just wanted to
go back and give something, try to change that neighborhood.

I think it's important for us to find some ways for people
of different racial and income backgrounds and regional backgrounds to
work together for the common good in a nonbureaucratic way. So I think
it's a tiny cost for a big game. And that's our difference.
(Applause.)

Questions?

MR. GENDRON: Mr. President, Mr. Speaker --

THE PRESIDENT: Do you want to have one more question --

MR. GENDRON: Ladies and gentlemen, we have time for one
more question.

Q This is mainly intended for the Speaker. If the
Congress gives the President a line-item veto without any amendments,
wouldn't that lower our budget and help the deficit?

SPEAKER GINGRICH: The answer is, yes, it would. And I
support it. And I'm hoping we're going to be in conference this summer.
And the line-item vetoes aim specifically at appropriations bills. And
he's already indicated that's how he'd use it. And I hope we're going
to be able to get it passed and to him this summer so he can actually
use it. I strongly favor it. I think 43 of the governors have it. I
think you had it when you were governor of Arkansas.

And I think -- now, it's not going to be by itself a
panacea, but it's going to cut a couple of billion dollars a year of
pork out, maybe as much as $10 billion if we -- under certain
circumstances.

And I supported it when we had Ronald Reagan and George
Bush. And just as the other night, frankly, we tried to repeal the War
Powers Act to give the President back the right -- the legitimate power
of the Commander in Chief, I think that any President ought to have the
line-item veto. And I support President Clinton getting it.

THE PRESIDENT: I want to say, first of all, thank you very
much for that. We have -- some of the Republicans were worried because
the line-item veto legislation might also permit the President to
line-item-veto special tax -- as opposed to general tax legislation,
special tax legislation. I think it should include that.

But what I said -- I sent a letter, or I sent a statement
to the Speaker and to the Majority Leader of the Senate saying that I
know that a lot of the Republicans may think they want to give tax cuts
which they believe are good, which I don't agree with, so I would
commit, that for the remainder of this budget cycle this year, if they
would pass it this year, I would only use it on spending this year as a
gesture of good faith so we could get it into the law and begin to see
how it works.

Before we leave, I should have said one other thing on the
U.N. thing that I didn't. With all the differences we've had, except
for the United Nations, and one or two other minor things, the Speaker
has been very supportive of me on foreign policy. And one of the things
we have to do together is to figure out how to make his party in the
House somewhat less isolationist than it is. And I think they're only
reflecting the views of their constituents. That is, people want us to
tend to our problems here at home. They don't want us to waste any
money overseas.

Nothing is more unpopular than doing that now. But this is
a very small world and every time the United States walks away from
problems around the world, we wind up paying 10 times the price in blood
and money later on. So this is something we're going to have to work
together on. (Applause.)

SPEAKER GINGRICH: If I could -- let me say thank you and
good-bye first, and then let the President have the final say, as is
appropriate.

Let me just say, first of all, I agree with what he said,
although I can tell you in both parties the difficulties and the
problems of carrying the burden of America --

THE PRESIDENT: Same with the Democrats. It's not just the
Republicans.

SPEAKER GINGRICH: There's a real challenge for all of us
to go back home and explain why American has to lead.

Let me finally say to Lou and to everybody here who invited
us, I think this has been the best New Hampshire tradition, the best
American tradition. I think it is fabulous that you have us come over
and -- are we all right still? And I just want to say thank you to all
of you, and again, I want to thank the President. He didn't have to do
this. It was his idea. I think it's good for America and I'm grateful
for the chance to be here. (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: Let me close by thanking you. I've enjoyed
this and I expect you have, too. And most of all I want to thank all of
you for having us here, for listening, for asking the questions.

Q This man wants to say something, Mr. President.

THE PRESIDENT: What? (Laughter.) My chops are no good
today. (Laughter.) But I'll be over there in just a minute.

What I want to say is, when you all here us debating these
issues, I want you to think about some real big questions. And I want
you to think about the things that affect you, of course. When you hear
these numbers batted around, it won't mean anything. I want you to
think about if we propose a change in Medicare, if he does, I do, what
will -- how will it affect you. I want you to think about that, because
you should, and you should let us know.

I also want you to think about the big issues. What do you
think the federal government ought to be doing? What is the role of the
federal government as we move into the 21st century? How important is
it to reduce the budget deficit as opposed to dealing with, let's say,
the needs of our people for more investment in education and training,
and do you want us to do both?

We have problems in America that are not just political and
economic, they are also social, cultural, personal problems. Some
people you can't help unless they also are willing to help themselves.
On the other hand, you can't just go around and point the finger at
people and tell them to help themselves if they need a little help to
get down the road in life.

So these are these big, fundamental, basic questions that
are now being debated all over again in Washington, maybe for the first
time in 50 years, where we're really going back to
basics. And you need to be a part of that.

If you want us to work together, instead of figuring out
who's got the best 30-second attack on the other, you need to really
hammer than home. You need to tell the Congressman. You need to tell
the Governor. You need to tell all of us that -- be clear about your
difference, but don't divide the country. And let's try to do this.

Let me just close by saying this: I wouldn't trade places
with anybody in any other country. I get to represent you around the
world. And with all of our problems, the diversity of America, the
power of our entrepreneurial system, the resources and resolve of our
people, we're still in better shape for the next century than any other
major country in the world. And don't you ever forget it. (Applause.)

And what we owe you is our best efforts not only to show
you how we disagree in ways that make us look better than the other, but
to actually get things done that your lives and your children and your
grandchildren -- I'm going to do my best to do my part.